We spread thick oil paint on a piece of wood, waited for it to start to dry, and topped it with thin oil paint. The idea was as it completely dried, the paint would crack. So far it’s been a week and a half and it’s not all the way dry so we’ll see if it cracks or not at some point in the future.

The boys drew self-portraits including things that describe them. Cameron included his taekwondo belt, Fritz a computer, and Adrian a Switch and an apple.

We did a blending activity comparing how tempera paints and oil paints blend and also did oil glazing with the oil paint.

My dad started chemo again on Monday. His pancreatic cancer markers went way up in just a few months. I got to sit with him while he got his first treatment because my mom was sick with a cold. It was a long, tiring day, but still it was nice hanging out with him.

On Friday we finished the second quarter of the 2017-18 school year. We learned so much in the second 9 weeks. We love Layers of Learning. It’s the perfect combination of hands-on and lecture.

In history, we learned about Charlemagne, the Normans, the Feudal System, the Crusades, and Burgundy, Venice, and Spain. In Geography, we learned about France, Nigeria, Germany, the Balkans, and Switzerland. In Science, we learned about planets, stars, earth and moon, satellites, and humans in space. In the arts, we covered Carolingian art, the Canterbury Tales, Gothic art, religious art, and oil paints. We started every day by watching CNN 10 and then working on grammar and spelling using The Nose Tree.

Cameron finished learning the basics of fiction writing and wrote a short story. He started working on writing poetry. He read The Origins of Everything in 100 Pages (more or less), Wulf the Saxon, Will in Scarlet, God’s Battalions: The Case for the Crusades, and God’s Jury: The Inquisition and the Making of the Modern World. He continued learning about personal finance and opened an investment accounts. His grades were excellent:
History A
Geography A
Science A
Art A
PE A
English A
Math A

Fritz learned more logical fallacies and applied some of what he’s learned to current events. He continued learning lots of Latin vocabulary and endings. He learned how to play more songs on the piano and to draw better. He had continued improving his outlines and paragraphs. He read Son of Charlemagne, If All the Swords in England, Catherine, Called Birdy, My Story: The Great Plague, and, The Red Keep. In math, he continued preparing for pre-algebra. Along with his little brother, Jacob, Enos, Jarom, Omni, Words of Mormon, Mosiah, and part of Alma in the Book of Mormon. His grades were also excellent:
History A
Geography A
Science A
Art A
Music A
PE A
Religion A
English A
Math A
Logic A
Latin A

Adrian practiced narrating lots of passages from books. He read Stories of Roland Told to the Children, Joan of Arc, One Big Family, Starry Sky, Chanticleer and the Fox, Castle Diary: The Journal of Tobias Burgess, Robin Hood, and Chris Hadfield and Living on the International Space Station. He continued learning to play the piano and to speak Spanish. He had moved on to doing division in math. His grades, like his brothers’, were excellent:
History A
Geography A
Science A
Art A
Music A
PE A
Spanish A
Religion A
English A
Math A